6:35
Half of us left the camp yesterday (including the leader). It was the first sad good-bye and I wished they could have stayed longer... It was a very nice group... 7 of us are left and the next group will arrive tomorrow morning. As far as I heard 25 people are planning to come which makes us 32. The bus will be crowded but more work gets to be done :)
Yesterday night after the others left we talked again with Kato-san. I think Cecilia and Ruben shared his opinion. It is so Japanese to think about the emotional impact rather than on the physical work. I'm not sure how it is in other countries but I was always so limited to the work which has to be done and of course I realized that people are grateful and happy that we helped but beyond this I didn't think of any more effects our work could have. I'm really thankful that Kato-san opened our eyes to a whole new layer of volunteer work. I always tried to stay away from the effected people. I didn't want them to feel ashamed that they need help and actually JAR told us to not ask them questions etc. But I think the situation has changed... I think that people want to talk now. They need people to share their emotionally pressure with... I will try to adjust to this... Like Cecilia did. She is free of former experience and so friendly and open-minded that she was able to directly jump into the new situation. Let's see what the other days will bring...
7:50
The fog is still all over the mountains but I have a bad feeling that won't protect us from the sun long. I don't even want to imagine how it was to work here in August...
I'm wondering if we get teamed with another volunteer group. 7 of us is probably not enough to clean the size of sites we are used to...
Kato-san and Ruben are the new leaders of our little group until the new leader arrives with the next bus. I know that Ruben takes it quite seriously and that he thought a lot about his position even if it is just for a day. Let's see what kind of leader he is and if we are still friends at the end of the day... Just kidding ;)
18:30
Today was really hot so the volunteer center cut our working hours by one. But we were lucky anyway because we were working under a roof protected from the sun. The roof belonged to a former production hall of the same company we worked for on the first day. The tsunami hit the building and ripped off all walls. We were assigned to clean the goods which were still left. The three girls of us did clean a kind of metal thing maybe for doors? I don't know but we used petrol and some metal brushes to get rid of the rust as good as possible. The work was quite easy. And even if we wouldn't have had a roof I don't think it would have been too bad... Just boring again...
In the lunch break Cecilia gave us an interview. I'm basically out of the documentary project and just update the homepage but Ruben and Patrick chose to make another documentary for their graduation project. The focus won’t be the same as the first video but a close angle... Satoshi was giving them an interview yesterday but I think that's it so far. For the other interviews they'll try to get people from the volunteer center, the city, maybe schools and temples... I'm really looking forward to seeing the finished video.
After the lunch break we went on with the work and before we left, the 6 men told us that they are the managers of the company. The company is basically bankrupt and they are working part-time to get the last things done. They had to fire all people because they didn’t have enough money to employ them any longer. It is really sad. One important part of the recovery of RT should be the maintenance of jobs. Cecilia was negatively surprised that such action isn't part of the government program. But I'm not sure if the company wasn't insolvent even before 311. Well, I didn't want to be so impolite to ask but if I consider the condition of our first work place, it's more likely that they must have had financial problems for some time. Which isn't surprising since Tohoku (except for Sendai and a few other places) was never especially rich.
One really unusual thing at the beginning was that one of the managers told us where to go in case of a tsunami warning. I never expected another tsunami but he is right... Especially because we were directly at the coast and the wave breakers are all damaged. He lost 9 members of his family... I start to wonder if there are people left who didn't lose a beloved person. I hope nobody of us has ever to experience something like this...
22:30
Ruben cooked for us an interesting but oishii version of Spaghetti Cabonara. Tomorrow 27 new people are coming. It's difficult to imagine how we can all fit into the bus... And more importantly into the tents... I am kind of looking forward them but at the same time I am sure I'll miss the calm atmosphere of the nights. Guess so many people won't be calm ;)
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